Karnataka Minister Kharge challenges RSS on freedom struggle role, defends public property Bill

Karnataka Home Minister Priyank Kharge on Saturday intensified his criticism of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), questioning the organisation’s participation in India’s freedom struggle and challenging it to name a single movement it had joined.

Speaking to reporters in Kalaburagi city, Mr. Kharge said the freedom struggle comprised numerous mass movements that drew participation from diverse sections of society. He claimed he could list 500 Congress members who had sacrificed their lives during the struggle and challenged the RSS to provide even 50 such names.

The Minister also referred to Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, stating that BJP leaders were unaware of the circumstances behind the honorific “Veer” attached to his name. He claimed that Savarkar himself had adopted the title.

Mr. Kharge further questioned the RSS’s role during the communal violence that followed Partition, asking what contribution the organisation had made towards protecting people during the riots.

On the RSS’s legal status, he said an organisation could not be banned without first establishing its legal status. Referring to recent remarks by RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat and B.L. Santosh that the organisation could not be banned, Mr. Kharge said, “RSS cannot be banned” because, according to him, it was not registered. He questioned how an organisation could be banned if it was not formally registered.

Rejecting the BJP’s allegation that the proposed Karnataka Regulation of Use of Government Premises and Public Property Bill, 2026, was aimed at the RSS, Mr. Kharge asked why the BJP was opposing the Bill without examining its provisions. He pointed out that the Bill did not name any organisation, association, institution or political party.

He said the proposed law was intended to provide a statutory framework for regulating the use of public property in accordance with directions issued by the Supreme Court and High Courts. Organisations would continue to be free to conduct activities on private premises, but programmes, processions and gatherings on government land and other public property would be subject to permission from the Competent Authority.

“There is no question of banning any organisation,” Mr. Kharge said, asking the BJP to identify where the Bill proposed such a ban.

He said the government’s responsibility was to ensure that public spaces were used in a regulated manner and that the proposed provisions would apply to organisations irrespective of their registration status.

Dismissing the BJP’s claim that he feared the RSS, Mr. Kharge said he had no “RSS-phobia” and asserted that it was BJP leaders who were displaying what he termed “Priyank-phobia”.